


I Don't.

by pherryt



Series: Bucky Barnes Bingo [14]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Angst, Arranged Marriage, Fluff, Kidnapping, M/M, Marriage of Convenience, Rescue Mission, Running Away, Taking Risks, The Avengers - Freeform, Tony wants to help, Wedding, deaf!Clint, enlisting, except steve and bucky, hurt!Clint, hurt!bucky, lucky - Freeform, mention of other characters, minor off screen deaths, some cameos blink and you'll miss them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2019-11-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:46:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21578605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pherryt/pseuds/pherryt
Summary: Bucky and Steve are looking forward to their end of High school roadtrip when Bucky is surprised with the news of an arranged marriage to some guy he'd never met. To get out of it, Bucky runs away and joins the army.It had seemed a good idea at the time...Okay, that was a lie. Even Steve knew it was a bad idea, but that didn't stop Bucky from doing it.
Relationships: Winterhawk
Series: Bucky Barnes Bingo [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1416790
Comments: 27
Kudos: 155
Collections: Bucky Barnes Bingo 2019, Clint Barton Bingo, Mandatory Fun Day, Winterhawk Bingo





	I Don't.

**Author's Note:**

> Filling:  
> • Bucky Barnes Bingo – Arranged Marriage  
> • WinterHawk Bingo – Marriage of Convenience  
> • Clint Barton Bingo – Arranged Marriage  
> • Mandatory Fun Day – You Either Do, or you Don’t – Marriage AU
> 
> I can't believe i managed all of them in the same work. SOMEBODY didn't believe it was possible (to be honest, Hawksonfire, i wasn't sure it was either)
> 
> So this is a weird AU where SOME of the Avengers exist, but not all , and nobody knows Tony Stark is Iron Man
> 
> Okay, i've tried re-reading this but i have had a headache more days of this week than not... and my posting window is growing ever smaller with work and hoidays etc if i wanna hit the MFD as well lol

When Bucky turned 18, he and Steve both graduated high school. Bucky couldn’t wait – Steve was his best friend, his brother (he’d even moved in with Bucky after his own mother died) and the two of them had planned a summer road trip – their last blast before going off to college.

Of course, his parents ruined that by announcing his arranged marriage to some billionaire or whatever that Bucky couldn’t give two shits about. They were _ruining_ his life. How could they have _done_ this to him? Steve watched him stomp around his room sympathetically.

“What were they _thinking?”_ Bucky shouted. “An arranged marriage. Seriously. In this day and age? In ‘America’? What. The. Hell. Land of the free, my ass,” he finished on a growling mutter.

He flopped over onto his bed dramatically – hey, the situation sure as hell warranted it, in his opinion – and threw a hand over his eyes, groaning. “How the hell am I getting out of this? Two weeks. I got _two weeks.”_

Steve sat on the end of the bed, staring at the wall with his thinking face on. Bucky peered out from under his arm while Steve chewed on his lip. “You got any bright ideas, Stevie?”

“One but…” Steve paused, biting his lip and giving Bucky an uncertain look.

“But what?” Bucky said, sitting up so fast it made his head spin.

“But it’s not ideal,” Steve said with a shrug.

“Just spit it out. _Anything’s_ gotta be better than marrying a guy I’ve never met,” Bucky said.

“I don’t know about that. And it wouldn’t be a permanent solution either, but it might give us time to come up with something?” Steve said uncertainly.

Bucky shifted and knee walked over the bed to Steve, taking the skinny shoulders into his hands, tempted to give his ass a little shake. “Don’t hold me in suspense, punk. Not over something this important.”

“Okay,” Stevie said slowly, squaring up his shoulders and shaking Bucky off of him. “Have you ever considered the army?”

* * *

Steve’s plan was kinda brilliant and absolutely stupid.

Bucky, without a single thought other than “I’m gonna regret this,” headed straight for a recruitment office without delay. He was offered two different options for departure, but since the second one wouldn’t have delayed the wedding, Bucky pushed for the first.

He left for basic training within days, telling no one but Steve what he was doing.

Because sure, it was dangerous as hell, but Steve was right. Either it’d kill him, and he wouldn’t have to marry a perfect stranger, or it’d give him time to figure a way out. Because once he signed that contract, Bucky was committed. He’d be deployed before a wedding could take place.

A week left to the wedding, Bucky hopped a bus to S.C., only Steve the wiser to where he’d gone. They hadn’t dared take the car for a different sort of road trip than they’d planned. It was the first thing his parents would have checked for. So Bucky got on the bus, and Steve took the car upstate to throw them off the scent.

It was 18 hours of travel torture, and certainly not the fun filled road trip he and Steve had planned ,as the what if’s started rambling about in his head (He could _die_ doing this, oh my god! What had he been _thinking?)_ but he made it uninterrupted to Fort Jackson. Still, Bucky didn’t breathe a sigh of relief until he’d stowed away his bag and gotten his uniform and a bunk. Then it was 10 weeks of basic, which included proving himself on the sniper range – which, apparently, he was scarily good at - and then off to a warzone.

* * *

Warzones were way more boring than tv and movies had led Bucky to believe. Well, to be fair, it was only boring until it wasn’t and then it was way too much _not_ boring, way too gory and also scary as hell.

Bucky wasn’t sure he was going to make it. Sure, enlisting had gotten him out of an untenable situation but… he wasn’t altogether sure the exchange had been worth it.

Then the first letters from his family started arriving. Bucky had finally let them know where he’d gone after he’d been safely en route to Afghanistan and, well, to say they weren’t pleased would be an understatement.

Steve had already gone off to college to follow his dreams of an art career and here Bucky was, throwing his own dreams away for an escape from someone he’d never even give a chance.

Bucky hadn’t even bothered to remember the guys name. But he still could have _met_ him, right? At least found out if he _could_ have liked the bastard? It was too late for that now, however, as Bucky found himself far from home and lonely as hell.

Oh, he got along well enough with the rest of his unit, but it wasn’t the same as his friendship with Steve.

Okay. Bucky had to admit it. He was fucking homesick.

* * *

Three and a half years in, the plan seemed to be going well. Or at least, Bucky was alive, unmarried and still had time (not all that much, actually, but Bucky was refusing to think about that) to work on a plan to remain so. (Things _might_ not be looking too swift on that front, to be honest, but Steve was still hopeful, so Bucky was cautiously hopeful too).

Of course, that’s when things went to hell.

Some hotshot had gotten himself kidnapped and Bucky’s unit was being sent on a retrieval mission. Bucky looked at the information packet he was handed in preparation for the mission in disbelief.

“Hawkeye?” he asked. The guy was a sharpshooter, a legend in the field. He wasn’t actually army. Or, well, any sort of military at all. He was an independent, one of the Avengers. How the _hell_ was Bucky’s unit supposed to rescue a guy from one of the most elite teams in the world? If _Hawkeye_ had been captured, then what sort of chance did Bucky and his team stand?

And why weren’t the other Avengers taking care of this?

He slapped the packet back down on the desk. “This is bullshit. It’s a suicide mission.”

His commander glared at him. “You will _take_ the mission, sergeant. You have no choice.” The man relented slightly. “The Avengers are off dealing with a bigger threat then the loss of one man, but neither can they leave him where he is. Your team is the best, so congratulations. Don’t fuck it up.”

* * *

So, things hadn’t gone well. It had, in fact - as Bucky had feared - been a trap. Specifically, a trap laid out for the other Avengers.

And Bucky’s unit had paid the price.

Far from the loneliness of those early days, Bucky had become close to them, his fellow soldiers becoming first friends, then family. A family forged in fire, and taken out by those same flames.

Bucky and Hawkeye were the only ones who got out alive, and they didn’t do it unscathed. The tail end of the explosion had reached them, shrapnel slicing at Bucky’s arm, making it nearly useless. They didn’t even have time to properly look after it, just wrapping a bandage around to hold it immobile and (hopefully) stop the bleeding and keep moving.

Now they were stumbling across the desert towards the closest mountain range, stubbornly pushing on and hopelessly lost and Bucky couldn’t tell if he was burning up from the heat of the sun or an infection.

Both seemed likely, but he didn’t tell Hawkeye.

Couldn’t, in fact, tell Hawkeye. The same explosion had done a number on Hawkeye’s ears. If his lack of answers to Bucky questions hadn’t been a clue, the dried trickles of blood trailing from his ears and down his neck would have made it obvious to even the most oblivious.

So, talking was out, which was good because Bucky didn’t think he was too coherent. They huddled together at night for warmth, Bucky sharing out his few rations that hadn’t gotten blown up, and waited for the enemy to find them.

Bucky didn’t think they’d last if that happened. They had 3 good arms, two knives and a rifle between them.

At least neither of them were still bleeding, though Bucky’s arm had lost feeling in it a day out from the explosion.

That _couldn’t_ be a good sign.

* * *

Bucky had no idea when they stopped walking, coming to with Hawkeye hovering over him. They’d taken cover, though Bucky couldn’t remember it, in a cave at the base of the mountains where Bucky was alternatively freezing and burning up.

The sound of running water hit his ears and a cool cloth bathed his head, a freshly filled canteen pressed to his lips. He faded in and out, gasping awake at odd intervals, nightmares and hallucinations swirling in his head.

Hawkeye looked after him, concern clear on his face, his calloused hands gentle as he took care of Bucky. Bucky clutched at him, a lifeline, convinced he was going to die here, afraid he’d been left alone and Hawkeye was a hallucination like the rest.

It was there, in the stillness and relative safety of the cave that Hawkeye began to talk. Bucky only caught parts of it, but the sound of his voice was soothing, knowing he wasn’t alone even as he wondered if they’d ever get out of here.

“You have to go,” Bucky croaked in a halfway lucid moment. Hawkeye just tilted his head at Bucky and continued talking. “I’m not gonna make it man,” Bucky said, tears gathering in his eyes, a sob catching in his throat. “You have to leave, save yourself before the supplies run out.”

Bucky fumbled at his pockets and his pack, searching for the last of the rations and trying to push them on Hawkeye. Hawkeye paused and looked down quizzically before realization flashed over his face and his expression turned grim and determined.

“No, I’m not leaving you here,” he said and Bucky choked down another sob, bit his lip and shook. Hawkeye laid down beside him, holding him carefully and Bucky was selfishly glad that Hawkeye hadn’t left him to die alone.

* * *

It was a paratrooper who found them, though things were hazy for Bucky at that point.

There was jostling, noises, pain and then numbness. Once or twice, Bucky woke and panicked because he couldn’t see Hawkeye, but then Hawkeye would slip into view, a clean bandage covering his head now and he’d take Bucky’s hand and Bucky would relax, drifting off again.

There was dizziness and weightlessness, then softness and beeping, and through it all, Bucky drifted, relaxing only when he felt that grip.

When he finally came to, more alert than he’d been in… who knew how long… (but still fucking exhausted) Bucky found himself in a hospital bed, a hand still holding his. He looked down at it in wonder, eyes tracking up, along the arm until he landed on Hawkeye, who lay asleep in a chair he’d pulled close beside the bed.

Bucky blinked at him in confusion.

“You wouldn’t let go of him,” someone said. Bucky jerked, his hand involuntarily tightening around Hawkeyes as he tried to turn his head. Whoever had spoken took pity on him and the drugs that must be in his system and walked into view.

Frowning, Bucky tried to place the man with the sharp suit, sunglasses and goatee.

“Who’r’you?” Bucky slurred. God, he was so fucking tired. It had taken all his energy to get the damn words out.

“You don’t - ? Of course you don’t,” the man shook his head with a rueful chuckle. “Name’s Tony Stark. _You_ might know me as Iron Man. And I wanted to thank you for saving Clint. I’m sorry about your unit.”

Bucky’s frown deepened. _This_ was Iron Man? Wasn’t Tony Stark some eccentric billionaire? Then again, how much more eccentric could you get than flying around in a metal suit playing superhero?

“Why?” Bucky managed to ask. He could feel exhaustion and drugs pulling him under again.

“Why what?” Stark asked, his eyebrow going up. He rocked back on his heels, hands shoved into his pockets. “Fraid you’ll have to be a tad more specific than that, James.”

He struggled to keep his eyes open and Stark must have seen it. “Get some rest, we’ll talk later.”

* * *

The next time he woke, Stark was gone but Hawkeye – _Clint_ – was still there, awake this time and arguing with a redhead. At least, he thought they were arguing. The room was strangely quiet as they waved their hands around.

“Hello?” Bucky croaked.

The redhead reacted instantly, Clint following her gaze. When he saw Bucky awake, his face broke into a broad smile.

“Hey, James,” Clint said, returning to Bucky’s side. “So, I still can’t hear ya, but Pepper here can help us out with that.”

Pepper rolled her eyes. “I’m here for other reasons than being a translator, actually.” She joined them in a couple of brisk steps. “We have a bit of a PR nightmare, to be honest, and we were hoping you could help us out with it.”

Her hands moved as she talked and Clint watched them closely – oh, Bucky realized. Sign language. He’d barely realized this when Clint growled.

“And I said _no,_ Pep. It isn’t fair to him,” Clint waved in Bucky’s direction. “He rescued me, lost his men, lost his – “ Clint stopped, turning pale, then swallowed.

“Lost my what?” Bucky asked, but of course, Clint didn’t hear him and kept going.

“You do not get to ask more of him because the public likes to throw accusations around until something sticks.”

“Lost my _what?”_ Bucky asked again, looking at Pepper now, making his voice a little louder, but he couldn’t help the shakiness of it.

Pepper looked at him sadly. “I think we should get a doctor in here,” she murmured.

Bucky reached for her and said, “No, tell me. What did I - “

He stopped. Looked down at his left arm, the one he’d reached out with except, there wasn’t much left to do that. His eyes went wide. “Oh god,” he whispered.

Pepper winced. “I’m so sorry, I thought somebody told you.”

“He hasn’t been awake enough for that,” Clint said softly. “Which is why you can’t pile more shit on top of him.”

“Clint – “

“No, I don’t care.”

She gave him a sharp, resigned nod. “As long as you understand what this means,” she said, her hands flying in dizzying motions.

He closed his eyes against it and only opened them again when he heard the soft click of the door. Clint stood there, hands on his hips. staring down at the floor, a troubled expression on his face.

Reaching out with his right hand this time, Bucky managed to grab Clint’s sleeve. Clint looked at him and sighed. “I suppose you want to know what that was all about?”

Bucky nodded.

“Don’t worry about it,” Clint said.

Shaking his head, Bucky tugged on his sleeve again. There was no point in speaking if Clint couldn’t understand him and even if Bucky knew sign language, he didn’t know how he’d manage it now. Clint wiped a hand down his face. “Fuck. _Fuck_.”

Staring at Clint hard, Bucky waited. Clint dragged his chair over, turned to face Bucky and slumped into it.

“So, okay, the Avengers are getting some blow back about not coming to my rescue. They’re being accused of treating me like a disposable teammate. Which certain members of the public are taking to mean that the Avengers aren’t so civic minded after all – if they can’t even take care of their own, then how can they really care about the ‘common man’,” Clint said.

Bucky stared at him. “That’s stupid as fuck,” he said.

Clint shook his head. “Sorry, I can’t – oh, wait, I’ve got an idea.” He turned, grabbed a bag and pulled a beat up notebook and a pen out of it, flipped it to an open page and laid it out on Bucky’s lap. Bucky wrote, “That’s stupid as fuck,” then underlined it three times.

Clint laughed. “Yeah, you’re telling me.”

“So what’s that got to do with me?” Bucky wrote.

“Errr…” Clint looked away from Bucky and turned beat red. “Look, by the time we got back, some rumors got started. Apparently, the reason that the Avengers didn’t come after me themselves, was because my boyfriend did it first. I guess some people saw how you wouldn’t let go of my hand, saw me camped out here waiting for you to wake up and… they drew their own conclusions. And the public, they’re eating it all up. A love story, complete with rescue. It’s apparently romantic. And Pep thinks… we should roll with it.”

Clint winced and rubbed at the back of his neck. “Says we tell everyone you’re my fiancé and arrange a wedding in a few weeks. Tony’s got the money to make it look like it’d been arranged a while ago.”

Bucky stared at Clint with wide eyes. “You gotta be shittin’ me,” he wrote. He started laughing hysterically and Clint turned to stare at him in concern.

Holy fucking shit. How was this Bucky’s life? He’d run away to the fucking army to get out of a marriage and now he was apparently being asked to go through with one anyway. At least he knew he liked Clint, what little he knew of him, which was more than he could say for the other guy he’d never even met. And if he was already married to an Avenger – of all people – there was no way Bucky could be forced to unmarry him and marry the rich jerk his parents had arranged instead.

God.

Married at 22.

This had never been his plan at all.

Neither had blowing up his arm but, nothing he could do about that now.

“James?” Clint’s voice was panicked and babbling. “Shit, I knew I shouldn’t have told you this. This isn’t your problem and it’s _definitely_ too much to ask. I told Pepper it was too much. Don’t worry, this is on me. It won’t hurt you in anyway if you say no, okay? You don’t have to do this though I really hope we can still talk or hang out or something after this cause I like you and oh fuck, I don’t think I ever said thank you for saving my life! So uh, thank you, I guess – wait, not I guess. Definitely thank you -”

James dropped the pencil and grabbed Clint’s hand, managing to interrupt the babble as he squeezed Clint’s hand as reassuringly as he could, holding on for dear life as he tried to calm _himself_ down. He closed his eyes and breathed in and out a few times as the hysterical laughter eased up. Finally, he pulled his hand back and picked up the pencil again.

“I’ll do it,” he wrote.

Clint gaped at him. “No, James, you –“

“And call me Bucky,” Bucky wrote. “If we’re going to get married, you might as well call me Bucky.”

“I don’t understand why you’d _want_ to,” Clint murmured, looking like _he_ was the one in shock when, by all right, it probably should be Bucky. Once the drugs were out of his system completely, Bucky was sure he would be absolutely freaking out more about his arm and his unit, but right now, he was just so tired, and he liked Clint and it seemed like Clint liked him at least enough to be friends. This could work. “I just don’t see what you’d be getting out of this.”

“Well, a new arm, for one,” Stark said suddenly. “And a way out of our arrangement for another.”

Bucky startled and looked to Stark, standing beside Clint. Clint frowned as Bucky’s gaze shifted and turned to face Stark himself.

He groaned. “Tony, what are you doing here?”

Stark held out a hand. Clint stared at him suspiciously. Stark rolled his eyes and shook his closed fist. “C’mon, Legolas, I spent a lot of time on these, so take ‘em already.”

‘Them’ turned out to be hearing aids as Clint wrapped them around his ears with a grimace, taking a few moments to test and adjust. Bucky gratefully put the notebook aside, exhausted again, but not yet ready to drift off.

“What did you mean?” Bucky demanded when Stark was no longer preoccupied with Clint.

“About what? The arm?” Stark waved a hand over his head. “It’s no problem. Least we can do for the assist. Hell, we could make you an honorary Avenger -”

Bucky shook his head. “No, thanks,” he said, shifting uncomfortably. “Besides, it was literally my job,” he muttered.

Stark shook his head. “Barnes, you wouldn’t have even been out there if it hadn’t been for me,” he said. Clint shot him a confused look, as did Bucky. “Look, I had no idea you were being forced into it. I’d never have agreed to it otherwise. That you felt you had to join the army to get out of it? That’s on me. Sure, it put you in the right place at the right time to help Clint, but what you’ve lost? I can’t make that up for you, but I’m gonna help however I can.”

Bucky’s head felt like molasses as he tried to work that through. He blinked, and blinked again, the time between closing and opening his eyes getting longer.

“Never mind, we’ll talk later,” Stark said, patting the blanket covering Bucky’s leg.

* * *

It turned out that Tony Stark was the one. _Th_ e guy his parents had arranged for him to marry. How weird was that?

The whole conversation had been a little surreal and Bucky wasn’t sure he’d even caught everything. Something about Obadiah and settling down and owing Bucky’s dad a favor for… something. Only Obadiah had turned out to be some kinda backstabbing dick and Tony hadn’t been all that eager to tie himself down anyway - he’d just gone along with it because Obadiah had been like a dad to him and…

And…well, as Tony had said earlier – or started to say - if he’d known Bucky would have thrown himself into harms way just to get away from Tony, he’d have called the whole thing off.

So Tony was blaming himself for Bucky losing his arm. Clint was blaming himself for it too, never mind that the poor man had been kidnapped, tortured _and_ lost his hearing to boot. Then when Bucky woke up and saw his family gathered about him – mom and dad, Steve and Becca - he found that Steve was, of fucking course, _also_ blaming himself, since the army had been his idea to begin with.

Though Steve at least had the good sense _not_ to say anything about _that_ around their parents.

Bucky didn’t think their parents would forgive Steve as easily as he did. But what else could he do? Steve had only offered an option, had even pointed out how bad of one it was. Nobody had made Bucky take it, only Bucky’s stubbornness.

When at last Bucky got some alone time with Steve, they talked about that a bit. There may have been crying. Bucky was going to blame the drugs.

They _also_ talked about Tony – and how weird it was that it was the same guy. Steve couldn’t believe it either – what were the odds?

It took Bucky a while to be ready to leave the hospital, and fly back to the states, his family and Clint in tow. Clint trailed along, looking lost, but absolutely playing up the adoring, _grateful_ boyfriend for anyone who was looking.

He did it so well, Bucky sometimes forgot it was pretend.

Of course, home meant therapy, both mental and physical. It meant nightmares that had been held at bay by drugs and pure exhaustion. It meant a whirlwind of activity Bucky wasn’t ready for in the slightest.

Through it all, Clint was at his side, him and Steve vying for Bucky’s attention.

“I’m his brother and haven’t seen him in almost four years,” Steve said stubbornly, arms crossed over his chest. “It’s not like you have any _real_ claim on him.”

“Uh… well, according to Bucky, I kinda do,” Clint said sheepishly, rubbing at the back of his head in what Bucky had already learned was more than a nervous gesture, but one where Clint – for whatever reason – felt out of his depth. “And as we _are_ getting married, I’d actually like to get to know the man who’s gonna be my husband.”

“In name only,” Steve hissed. He had _not_ approved of the marriage once he’d learned it was a PR stunt.

Bucky, frankly, just didn’t care anymore. He was tired.

* * *

The wedding wound up happening a few months after he got home instead of a few weeks as had initially been suggested.

His mother was happy to see him get married, even if it wasn’t to the billionaire of her choice. Bucky was just glad that Clint was also a Brooklyn boy and he wouldn’t _have_ to permanently live in Manhattan if he didn’t want to. That Clint had living space in both places gave Bucky options.

For now, though, they were absolutely in Manhattan.

It was just easier to stay at Avengers Tower while Tony ran a bajillion tests to make Bucky an arm, Bucky attended therapy at the best places and so Pepper could include him and Clint on the wedding preparations. Steve stayed with him, giving him an anchor in all the change and chaos and – thank _god –_ Steve and Clint eventually started to get along.

Bucky even – as much as this was just a marriage of convenience – _liked_ Clint.

The wedding was simple, in as much as an Avenger wedding thrown by a billionaire could be simple – held on the rooftop garden terrace of the tower with all the trappings you could imagine (and thankfully not all the ones _Tony_ could imagine).

All of Bucky’s family were in attendance, and the wedding party was small – which Bucky was immensely glad of - with Steve as his best man and Becca as his bridesmaid. Clint, it turned out, didn’t have any family, but a pretty redhead called Natasha was _his_ best man, er… woman and a man named Phil was his groomsman.

And then there was the dog. A golden retriever with only one eye, tongue lolling out of his mouth in a happy grin, all set up in a tux of his own.

The dog was the ringbearer.

Bucky had thought it a disaster of an idea, but had been too tired to argue it. Now he was glad he hadn’t, the dog’s cheerful demeanor and wagging tail bringing a smile Bucky’s face and making the day more bearable.

It also made Clint smile, which was good, since it had been decided that the accents to the standard black and white colors of the wedding would be blue, much to Clint’s pouting dismay. He’d been hoping for purple – something Bucky would have been fine with, but Natasha had, apparently, drawn a line on.

The rest of the guests were a handful of friends on both sides, the rest of the Avengers and a small – very small – select group of reporters (it was, after all, a PR stunt, as Steve had reminded him only that morning) handpicked by Pepper herself.

And, of course, the photographers. News outlet photographers had to stay behind a line, but Tony had hired a pro photographer who’d brought along his intern who kept surprising Bucky and Clint by popping up in the strangest of places or contorting himself in the weirdest ways to get a photo.

(Later, when they were sorting through photos, it would turn out that the kids unorthodox methods were very effective).

* * *

The wedding went off without a hitch.

There was a ceremony with candles that Clint had fumbled for a second and the guests had held their breath until he managed to light his without setting anything else (or himself) on fire.

No one objected. Not that Bucky had expected them to.

Lucky – the dog – presented the rings and Bucky watched, a surrealness floating through him as Clint slid his ring on Bucky’s finger. Bucky couldn’t _feel_ it though (“Give it time, I’ll get there!” Tony had said. “This is just a generation one prototype.”)

Then the kiss. Soft, chaste, with Clint whispering, “Is this all right?” as he leaned in till Bucky just seized the moment, and seized Clint, and proceeded to give Clint the kind of kiss he’d always imagined embarrassing his guests with.

He succeeded and felt even more proud of himself at the dazed look on Clint’s face as the ceremony ended.

They danced, ate cake, listened to speeches and participated in silly wedding games and no one outside their little circle seemed to think the wedding anything but authentic.

And it was. On paper, anyway.

At least, so Bucky had thought. The fact that he’d started having feelings for Clint almost by the time they’d returned to Brooklyn made no never mind. It just made tying himself to Clint more bearable. Because at least he _liked_ Clint, even if he wished they actually _were_ the more the wedding pretended they were.

The kiss though, and Clint’s expression after and all the stunned, thoughtful looks Clint had snuck of him throughout the night. All the soft touches and standing close, the beaming smiles when Clint spoke of Bucky even though Bucky _knew_ he’d been a bear these past few months as he adjusted (or attempted to, anyway) and all the support Clint had been through all of _that…_

It made Bucky wonder if maybe there could be more to this wedding than a sham.

But Clint never pressed, never did anything more than Bucky indicated was okay and Bucky – on their way to Tony’s jet (he’d also gifted them with a honeymoon to some private island or something) – suddenly realized that the ball was in his court. That Clint, whatever he felt for Bucky, wouldn’t go further because he’d never expected Bucky to say yes, and they were both aware that it was just a marriage of convenience that mostly benefitted Clint and the team.

Tony had already said he’d provide Bucky with anything he needed whether he got married to Clint or not and Bucky had caught Clint staring at him in a mix of wonder and disbelief more than once in the weeks and months leading up to the wedding.

Bucky chewed it over in his head on the flight out, watching Clint for any sign that Bucky’s theory was right. He caught himself just staring as Clint sprawled, dozing with his head propped against Bucky’s shoulder and Bucky… he liked it.

He liked Clint.

He wanted more.

And when they finally landed and settled into the little beach house or bungalow or whatever it was called, Bucky decided to take a risk.

So he did.

And neither Bucky nor Clint _ever_ regretted that.

**Author's Note:**

> okay  
> the cameos - if you didn't guess them from the SUPER SUPER vagueness of them - the paratrooper who finds them is Sam and the photography intern is Peter
> 
> p.s.   
> rebloggable [Tumblr post here](https://pherryt.tumblr.com/post/189330568291/i-dont-marvel-winterhawk-rating-t-wordcount)


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